The publication of this book has been highly anticipated by many in the emerging field of public health informatics and it does not disappoint. Although seemingly targeted at those new or recently introduced to the discipline, or those "crossing over" from other areas within the broader informatics arena, content is very well-suited for all comers, with sufficient detail to satisfy even those familiar with the many issues detailed in the richly detailed case example chapters.

The breadth of material covered is excellent, making it especially appropriate as an introductory or intermediate text. Of particular interest will be the section of the book on "The Science of Public Health Informatics" which includes particularly fine chapters on information architecture, value assessment, management of personnel and projects, and organizational change. Bill Yasnoff does a particularly good job adding clarity to a muddled domain in a chapter on privacy, confidentiality, and security of Public Health Information. Those readers generally interested in PHI education, or with specific interest in developing training programs for PHI programs or for public health agency personnel would find great value in Janise Richard's chapter on core competencies.

The writing style is generally clear and illustrative, albeit not terribly concise. We have adopted this book as the core text for our graduate-level introductory course in PHI.

Some may hold up The Day of the Locust as the consummate Hollywood novel...or perhaps What Makes Sammy Run?, or the Nowhere City, or Play It As It Lays... Other than The Little Sister, the best book to portray Hollywood is also the first, Queer People. Written in the early Twenties, Queer People captures a Hollywood of sudden wealth and incredible wantoness, a new city without limits, seen through the eyes of a devilish reporter who seeks none

Although this book is nearly 50 years old, most of the information is still accurate. It's written for a young reader, yet adults will like it too. The writing is engaging, not dry, and my 9-year old boy finds the book fascinating. There are plenty of well-drawn pictures, too.

My background is geology and environmental sciences, and I stumbled across this book at our local library. My first impression was that it was just another dumpy old book that our library was hanging onto because they can't afford anything new. But once I took a closer look, I was immediately absorbed. What a gem!

Here are about half of the chapters:

Our Modern Stone Age
Rocks, Minerals and Ores
The Story of Aluminum
The Mineral Called Asbestos
Borax and Its Relatives
Clay of Many Kinds
Coal from Ancient Swamps
Copper, the Red Metal
Elements and Compounds
Feldspar and Quartz
Fluxes and Purifying Metals
Gems for Beauty and Work
Graphite for Pencils and Atomic Piles
Gypsum Has Many Uses

Iron, Our Most Useful Metal
Lead and Antimony

Here is an excerpt:

COPPER, THE RED METAL
In 1660 a French fur trader paddled around the northern shore of the region now called Michigan. At the mouth of one stream he found copper lumps, or nuggets. He also saw a small island "all of copper." It probably was a huge nugget, lying in Lake Superior.
Indians obtained copper in Michigan long before the fur trader found it. In some places they picked up nuggets that lay in stream beds or on beaches, but they also got the red metal from mines. First they located ledges in which copper could be seen. Then they built big fires and kept them going all day and all night. When the rock was very, very hot, the Indians pushed the fires away and poured cold water on the ledges. This made the hot rock cool so quickly that it cracked.

I've searched for a similar, more-up-to-date book, and I couldn't find a thing. But the age of the book has its good points. As long as an adult is there who knows which things are obviously out-of-date, it becomes even more entertaining and of historical significance. For example, there's a chapter on how great asbestos is! Now, of course, we know that the health drawbacks outweight the rock's usefulness. But it is interesting to read WHY people liked it so much (it really has a lot of great properties), and to marvel at how ignorant the population was about the health effects. AND, to make parallels with the vast variety of chemicals that are used today because they have such great properties, but with unknown health and environmental effects.

There are also a few quaint passages like the first lines under the chapter, "Coal From Ancient Swamps":

"'Fill your coal bins!' say advertisements which we see every spring. 'Store up a supply of coal so you will be warm next winter!'"

A reminder of how many people used coal to heat their houses back in the 1950's! What a kick!

Even though I already have a geology degree, I've actually been learning quite a bit from this book, partly because of the writer's clear and engaging style, and partly because no other books that I know of discuss many of the topics found in this book (aside from highly technical publications). After my son asked me to read him the library copy of the book for several weeks in a row, I found a copy online and ordered it. This one's a keeper!

Riding by Starlight is an exciting adventure story with non-stop action. I couldn't put it down! I highly recommend it for anyone who loves stories of the cowboys and the west.

This is one fast-paced, interesting and hilarious book. Rosie lives with her mum and Grandmother. Her aunt (her mothers twin sister) lives in America, but has never contacted Rosie's mother in all the years she has been there. One Sunday, Rosie asks her mother about her aunt and Rosie, intrested by her mothers stories, sets out to try to reconcile her mother and her aunt. Rosie gets so preoccupied by this problem, that when she gets hit by a car, she is transported back to 1956, to the week when everything starts to go wrong between her mother and her aunt. To return to her own time, Rosie must change the events of that week. One reason I enjoyed this book is because of the humour in it. The book is very funny-especially the parts where Rosie has to go to school in 1956, and Rosie's reactions to the clothes she has to wear in 1956 are also very funny. The characters in the book, especially Rosie are all very funny and interesting. I would reccommend this book to anyone who likes reading.

This book follows the adventures of a pony named Sassy and a little dog named Tough Enough through the mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina as they try to get back to the family they love so much.
The descriptions in the book are wonderful bringing the story to life in your imagination. The color illustrations are great and add to the beauty of the story.
This story is a great book to read aloud to children. The words flow very well.
You and the child you read this story to will enjoy this book very much.
You will probably have to visit your library to find this great book.

Brava, Jill Carroll! This publication of her doctoral dissertation does much more than solidify her position among academics - it argues persuasively for an image of God that is honest and inspiring.

Written in response to the political theologies of liberation and feminism, Carroll identifies a thoroughly natural theology in the works of Annie Dillard. Two chapters explain the God-image in Dillard's work, an image that is unconcerned with human ideologies, politics, and welfare. In nature, Dillard sees a God of "extravagance, beauty, violence, and power intertwined" that is separate from humankind. We are mere sojourners in this natural world that reveals a deity who is "savage, sinister, and arbitrary."

A fourth chapter connects the separateness of Dillard's conception of God and the radical Otherness of Emmanuel Levinas, especially as both counter the anthropocentric conceptions of a God of concern, compassion and nurturance.

In a fascinating fifth chapter, Carroll shows how, by avoiding a whitewash of divine violence and divine disinterest, a natural theology is capable of withstanding Feuerbach's criticism of religion as an idealized human, Freud's critique of religion as wish-fulfillment, and Nietzsche's critique of religion as an self-justifying schema for special interests.

Nature is violent and completely unconcerned with an individual's welfare. The image of God these brutal and empirical facts convey is one of dispassion and distance, but also one of extravagance and beauty. Carroll suggests that a God that requires a leap of faith and the adoption of a sectarian worldview has little influence in a nuclear and evolutionary age. The images of God revealed in nature, perhaps embraced better by aesthetic than by faith, may point the way to a theology of substance for a post-modern world.

If you have sat in church wondering why God is given credit for all the good things that happen, but never blamed for all the tragic, then this book is definitely for you.

I experienced this book during a class I took at Cambridge College over the summer. The moment I opened the book I was pleased with what it had to offer. I am a much better teacher since I have been exposed to the Brain-Compatible Pathways to Scientific Literacy Science for Every Learner by Kathleen Carroll. This book gives you opportunity after opportunity to bring life to a science classroom. I thank you for this exposure Dr. Carroll. Denean Kirkman Smith (Cambridge College, NITE student and 8th grade Science Teacher.)smiles.....

There have been several books on the Golden Dawn Cipher Manuscript. I have two others besides this one--but what this one does that the others don't do, is actually explain what the cipher (cypher) manuscript is all about. And the author does this grade-by-grade so you can follow along in the Golden Dawn and see where everything comes from. On top of that, Runyon presents the best defense of W. Wynn Westcott I've read yet. He makes us wonder just what kind of an axe Ellic Howe was grinding!

Also Runyon has some fascinating appendices on the "Eleven Sphere Tree" in the Ciphers (nobody else has this that I know of). Then, as a special addition: we have R.A. Gilbert's great article on Wynn Westcott's Cipher Notes. What a feast for Golden Dawn buffs! If you are going to get a book on the G.D. Ciphers, this is the only one you'll ever need.

"Secular Saints" by Joan Carroll Cruz, Tan Books and Publishers, Rockford, Illinois, 1989

Joan Carroll Cruz has done it again! After much work, the author has collected in one book a brief but essential biography of each of "250 Canonized and Beatified Lay Men, Women and Children". These saints, so listed, do not include any priests, nuns or monks. There are no popes. The author's stated goal was to write a book about lay people who achieved sanctity, in order to inspire today's lay people. In so doing, Ms Cruz has provided a compilation of little-known saints of the Catholic Church. The 250 persons are listed alphabetically, begining with St. Adalbald of Ostrevant (d. 650) and ending with St. Zita (1218-1278). Even though I was educated in Catholic schools, from grammar school through college, I have to admit that I did not recognize most of the individuals listed. In itself, this is a good reason for most of us to buy this book. Many of us will recognize St. Dominic Savio (1842-1857), who was recently canonized, the English king, St. Edward the Confessor (d. 1066), and, of course, the English Statesman, St. Thomas More (1478-1453). But what about Zdislava Berka of the former Czechoslovakia? Or St. Lufthild (d. c. 850).

Joan Cruz has complied a collection of mini-biographies of lay saints; this book is interesting and informative. The 250 people listed represent many different nationalities, and, time wise, from the early beginnings of the church up to the present, (for example Blessed Marcel Callo (1921-1945), a Frenchman who died in a Nazi concentration camp). This book is highly recommended as a worthwhile reference work.